‘”It was not a good experience,” Kennedy said. “I don’t want to say lies on their part, but just stuff that came out. They’re a team that’s up against the cap and they won’t put me on re-entry because even though my contract’s so low [$550,000], even the slightest bit would put them over the cap. They didn’t want to risk that, so I was stuck in the minors the whole year no matter what.”‘

‘”Why is it a macho thing? I don’t get that,” Gaustad said. “Why did I take my visor off after juniors? I don’t know. There is that macho thing. But I think I’m old enough to not be affected by what other people think anymore.”‘

‘“It’s not emotional at all,” Kennedy said about his return. “The only time it was emotional was when it first happened. … Coming back here, (it’s) just like playing in any other arena, except you have some of your friends and family watching you.”’

‘“We have to wake up and do what it takes to play a system in this league,” Miller said. “You’re not going to get away with making cute plays, you’re not going to be able to carry the puck in…you’re not going to have that luxury. Too many mistakes, myself included. We’re all accountable here.”’

‘Trailing 2-1 with less than five minutes to play, Florida went on the attack with each team having four skaters due to concurring penalties. Fleischmann skated down the left side of the Buffalo zone and sent a cross-ice pass to Tomas Kopecky. Kopecky fanned on his one-timer attempt, but recovered the puck and bounced a pass off the boards behind the net back to Fleischmann, who laid an easy backhander into the open net before Miller could recover to tie the game with 3:58 to go.’

‘“We’re doing a good job at talking off the ice and seeing what we can do better and where we want to be in certain situations,” Pominville said Friday. “I think it reflects on the way we’ve been playing on the ice. But we’re working hard, we’re skating hard and we’re creating things offensively.”’

‘Jochen Hecht missed practice Friday. Lindy Ruff said, “We had to give him another day off, he wasn’t doing that well today. We’re just trying to figure some things out. Not to go into detail, but he could be back to full go tomorrow. He’s seeing some people today and there’s a chance he could practice again tomorrow.”‘